Free To Choose

Today, we honor the men and women who served our nation in uniform. Their sacrifices protect the freedom to choose our own paths and build better lives. To all veterans: thank you for your service. From our film, The True Cost of Defense: youtube.com/watch?v=UsCwDf_r…

Will the robotaxi do to Uber what Uber did to the taxi? In this clip from Perspectives Matter, host Dennis McCuistion asks Samford University economics professor Art Carden about one of the most useful ideas in economics: Joseph Schumpeter’s creative destruction. Every advance replaces something, Carden explains, and there’s no such thing as a free lunch. From taxis to Uber to driverless cars, he shows how fast that cycle moves today and why he believes what we gain far outweighs what we lose. Watch the full interview on YouTube: youtube.com/watch?v=0hz248Ih…

Follow the money. Campaigns spend billions every election cycle, and that money has to land somewhere. Lou and Phil follow it from spam texts and haunting attack ads to a political consultant industry that turns out to be surprisingly large. Then comes the bigger question: what else could all that money have been used for? Step up to the bar for the full episode of Happy Hour Econ with @LouPerez and @PhilWMagness, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. happyhourecon.org/episodes/t…

Breakthroughs rarely start in a planning office. In Chile, Henrik Ekelund visits a vineyard and winery whose research center exists for one purpose: tackling the practical problems its growers and winemakers bring forward. That is market-driven, bottom-up innovation. Why Nations Prosper is now streaming on YouTube and public television. freetochoosenetwork.org/prog…

When a new problem appears, why is the answer so often more government? Milton Friedman argued that drastic problems can’t be solved with Band-Aid solutions. We have to look at the source and the cause. He also argued that individual policy fights are part of a bigger question: will we keep moving toward a collectivist society in every area, or will we stop and reconsider? His test for any proposed government solution was straightforward. Which of government’s other great reforms have achieved their objectives?

Some people hang a rock star poster above the bed. Phil would hang Milton Friedman. When Lou asks which Nobel economists Phil would put on that wall, Friedman is the easy first pick. He reshaped monetary economics, showed that central bank mismanagement turned the Great Depression into a catastrophe, and made complex ideas clear enough for anyone to follow. Last call for this episode of Happy Hour Econ with @LouPerez and @PhilWMagness, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. happyhourecon.org/episodes/n…

Prosperity starts with something simple: the freedom to own what you build. Why Nations Prosper travels across five continents to show how Freedom, Order, and Innovation turn that idea into thriving nations. Now showing on YouTube and public television! freetochoosenetwork.org/prog…

One sum for housing. Another for food. Another for clothing. Another for medical care. Milton Friedman opposed that whole approach to welfare. His view was simple: “The problem of poverty is money.” So rather than a separate program for each need, he proposed a single negative income tax that would assure people a minimum level of income. Then people could spend it on whatever they needed most, whether that’s housing, food, clothing, or medical care.

Has Woke Won? Recorded in 2024, host Dennis McCuistion sits down with Joanna Williams, author, columnist for Spiked and The Times of London, and visiting fellow at the Mathias Corvinus Collegium in Budapest, to ask whether woke has won. Drawing on her book How Woke Won: The Elitist Movement That Threatens Democracy, Tolerance and Reason, Williams defines woke as identity politics combined with an extreme form of political correctness, traces its roots to postwar European universities, and argues that its focus on race and gender comes at the expense of social class. Their conversation also covers the debate over gender identity, the influence of academia, and whether the 2024 U.S. election marked a broader public rejection of woke ideas. Listen now: blog.freetochoosenetwork.org…

What would change if more research followed the facts to their logical conclusion, even when the answer is unpopular? Jason Riley on the four things that distinguish Thomas Sowell’s scholarship. For more on Thomas Sowell, watch the documentary: Common Sense in a Senseless World. youtube.com/watch?v=WK4M9iJr…

Winning a Nobel Prize isn’t a matter of audience votes. Phil walks Lou through a selection process that looks more like a papal conclave than a talent show, and explains why most laureates are well past retirement age when the call finally comes. The full episode of Happy Hour Econ with @LouPerez and @PhilWMagness is on the house, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. happyhourecon.org/episodes/n…

Freedom. Innovation. Order. Henrik Ekelund traveled to three nations to find the forces behind lasting prosperity. Why Nations Prosper is now streaming on YouTube and airing on public television. Watch the full film: freetochoosenetwork.org/prog…

Who is responsible for the life you build? In this Perspectives Matter conversation with host Dennis McCuistion, Daniel T. Richards explains the core ideas of Objectivism. It holds that each person has an individual mind and must act on their own ideas, and that your own life is your highest moral purpose. He argues that most of the choices that matter, from career and marriage to whether to have children, are within your control. He says those choices are worth making with joy. Watch the full interview here: youtube.com/watch?v=XS5m63zm…

A Nobel Prize for a fancy math formula on vector autoregression techniques. It matters in academia, but cue the snoring. Phil and Lou talk about how the Nobel Prize in economics went from honoring great communicators to rewarding math only specialists can follow. As for the winners who decided the prize made them experts on everything? Phil has some names. All new episode of Happy Hour Econ with @LouPerez and @PhilWMagness. happyhourecon.org/episodes/n…

You can’t have it both ways. Milton Friedman pointed out a contradiction that plenty of people hold without noticing. They oppose monopolistic restrictions in a profession. They also oppose unlicensed practice. Friedman’s answer: you have to choose. Licensure gives monopoly power to someone, either government or the organized profession. You can’t eliminate the monopoly while keeping the thing that creates it.

Why Nations Prosper, A Personal Exploration by Henrik Ekelund, is out now on YouTube and public television. The one-hour documentary shows what happens when a nation frees its people to create. Across the Netherlands, Vietnam, Botswana, and Chile, Ekelund uncovers how Freedom, Order, and Innovation built lasting prosperity, and why Americans cannot take those forces for granted. Watch the full film on YouTube or find it on your local public television station. youtube.com/watch?v=aVvNIIBl…

The Impossible Burger was everywhere. Then it became a ghost haunting the grocery aisle. Lou and Phil hold a brief memorial for the plant-based meat boom and explain why hype is no match for taste buds. Stay for dessert with the full episode of Happy Hour Econ with @LouPerez and @PhilWMagness, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. happyhourecon.org/episodes/h…

Why is licensure so essential? Milton Friedman’s answer: take it away, and an organized profession would still have lots of power to do good, but no power to do harm. Licensure decides who gets admitted to practice. Whoever shapes the rules for admission holds the key to controlling the entire field.

Bob Chitester would have turned 89 today. In the late 1970s, he brought Milton and Rose Friedman a proposal: a 10-episode television series about free markets. His wager was simple. People will watch a program about economics if it tells a good story. Free To Choose proved him right. As executive producer, Bob brought Friedman's ideas into millions of living rooms, and he founded Free To Choose Network to carry that work forward. He spent the rest of his life making the case that freedom is worth understanding and worth explaining well. That work continues in every program we make today.

Conspicuous consumption, meet conspicuous production. Phil tells Lou why grocery stores make room for vegan products when roughly 1 in 100 Americans is vegan. The payoff isn’t in sales. It’s in the image of social responsibility. Come back for seconds with the full episode of Happy Hour Econ with @LouPerez and @PhilWMagness, on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube. happyhourecon.org/episodes/h…